Title: Giving Anonymously
Date: 2007-11-11
Reference: Matthew 6: 1-4
"The Creator God of the universe has entrusted each one of us, individually, with time, health, money, friends, family, material blessings, and great opportunities. Our objective is to maximize the investment God has placed into our hands. Each and every day is a new opportunity for stewardship, service, and mission. The English word mission comes from a Latin word for sending. Being a Christian includes being sent into the world as a representative of Jesus Christ. Jesus said: “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” (John 20:21). I received an e-mail that really made me laugh this week. Two little boys 8 and 10 were being mischievous and always getting into trouble. If any mischief occurred in their town these two boys were probably involved. The boys mother heard that a preacher in town had been successful in disciplining children so she ask him t speak with her boys. The preacher, an imposing man with a booming voice sat the younger boy down first and asked him sternly:”Do you know where God is Son?” The boy’s mouth dropped open but he made no response. So the preacher repeated the question in an even sterner tone.”Where is God?” Again the boy made no attempt to answer. The preacher raised his voice for effect and asked once again: “Where is God?” The boy bolted from the room and ran home. He said to his brother.”We’re really in trouble this time. God is missing and they think we did it.” If God turns up missing in the world, it’s often because we have not represented God as we have been called to do. Stewardship is about using everything God has loaned us to make God known.
Stewardship isn’t just about money.
It touches virtually every aspect of life and everything God puts into our hands. Stewardship is our giving and our serving. How we represent God in the world around us.
We give and serve because we love God and we believe in the vision of the church. We want to be an example for our children. We give and serve because we want to make this world a better place for all of us and because one day we want to hear Jesus say: “Well done good and faithful friend and servant. Good job.”
A truly generous giver is prompted to give and serve by seeing or hearing about a need and by being touched by it. Giving and serving are never to be done out of pressure or compulsion. Giving and serving are a matter of Grace not law. We are to give and serve because we want to give, we love to give, and we are grateful we can give.
When we consider the many blessing of life we know God created us to be channels and not containers. God meant for us to be rivers not reservoirs. God’s love and grace are to flow through us and not to be held in us. The compelling desire for a Christian Steward is to constantly give as the river of God’s blessings courses through our lives.
I strongly believe Godly giving and Godly service should be a private demonstration and not a public display. With rare exceptions our giving should be very private. God is pleased when a gift is given with regard only for God’s purposes and God’s glory.completely devoid of any attention drawn to the giver. No matter if we are giving of our time, talents, skills, or money, the gift should be a private affair between the giver and God.
Drawing attention to oneself when giving expresses an attitude of ownership not stewardship. Again we don’t own anything. We’ve been called to share everything. If you think your gift is something you own rather than something that has been entrusted to you, you have eliminated God from the equation all together. The wise steward never forgets that everything belongs to God and every gift is made possible by God alone.
Jesus said: “Be careful not to do good things before others to be seen by them. If you do you’ll have received your reward. And there will be no reward for you in heaven. Rather don’t let your left and know what your right hand is doing so that your giving and service may be secret. And the Father who sees you in secret will reward you.”
As we give, serve, and represent God we’re sometimes tempted to toot our own horn a bit. Everyone likes to be appreciated and thanked for a job well done. Many times we do what we do and are never thanked.
During the Great Depression of the 1930's a group of pastors decided they really had very little to be thankful for that year. Thanksgiving was coming but they really felt there was nothing to thank God for. One challenged all the others to name at least one thing to be thankful for. A pastor mentioned a former teacher. She had made a huge difference in his life. He was truly thankful for her. Later he sat down and dropped her a thank you note. In a few weeks he got a letter back. “I want you to know”she wrote, “how much your note meant to me. I am not old and I live all alone in a small room. I feel like the last lonely leaf of Fall or the last rose of Summer. I taught for almost 50 years and yours is the first note I have ever received. It came on a cold, gray, lonely morning and it cheered my soul like nothing else could. Have.”
This pastor decided to write a thank you note or notes each year to empress gratitude to others who had made his life easier and more enjoyable. He collected the responses he received and eventually had over 500 letters sent back to him.
Whether or not anyone ever thanks us we are to be faithful and good stewards sharing all God has placed in our hands. An important way for anyone of us to adequately express our Thanks to God is by sharing our blessings. By making a difference in the life of another person. Often we do that through the ministries of our church. Ministries we support with our time, prayers, and money.
A key to advancing the Gospel is for the church to be made up of individuals who consider it their task to do ministry rather than having a congregation of people who expect the staff of the church to minister to them. All of God’s people are ministers. We should never reduce our congregation to an audience.
Giving is your personal testimony. And nothing helps you grow as a Christian like serving and giving. Generosity transforms people and transforms the lives of people. Money is necessary to advance the Gospel. The average Mainline Christian today gives only 3% of his income to the church. The result is our cutting back on outreach and mission. How many times has a good idea been turned down or a vision limited because we were worried about how much it would cost?
We feel a little funny talking about money in the church. And yet Jesus talked more about handling money than he did about heaven, hell, or even loving one’s neighbor. Jesus knew where your treasure is there your heart will be also. More than half of Jesus’ parables relate to money.
Almost 2500 passages in the Bible deal with money and material possessions. Many congregations in America today are struggling and even dying. They have lost their focus. They are not evangelizing. They no longer tell the story. And they are having financial problems. When a congregation slips into a survival mode rather than seeing itself as a channel of blessing it begin to die. Sharing with the world around us is an important part of a healthy church. Generous giving can transform individual lives and the life of a church.
True generosity is not measured by the size of the gift but by the spirit of the giver. God uses small acts of kindness and ministry to accomplish great deeds. God, for one, is not impressed with outward appearances or with natural abilities. The Lord always looks upon the heart.
True generosity should be God centered not man centered. To give in order to impress others with our spirituality actually diminishes our spirituality and is an affront to God. As we give and serve we should never care with others think but only what God thinks.
Again Jesus said: “If you give to others you will be given a full amount in return. It will be packed down, shaken together, and spilling over into your lap. The way you treat others is the way you will be treated.”
We cultivate an inner joy by giving and sharing. Someone has said: “When it comes to giving and sharing, many people will stop at nothing.” A play on words but very true. The bible reminds us God loves a cheerful giver. We are most like God when we give and serve. And God is a lavish giver, God never gives grudgingly.
Jesus said even the right things can be done for the wrong reasons. If our motive in giving is to win the praise of others then we will call attention to what we are doing. If our motive is to serve God in love, to please God then we give without calling attention to ourselves or to the gifts. As a result we will grow spiritually. God will be glorified. Others will be helped. When we refuse to give, or when we give for the wrong motivations we rob ourselves of a blessing and reward. We rob God of Glory. And we turn our backs on those who need our help.
Everything in our hands comes from God’s hands. We are the channels through which God’s work is carried out. May we be found faithful."
